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CRITIQUE:

For the Obsession of Groovers

I've been obsessed by Robyn Hitchcock since some time in the 1980's.

He has a fantastic taste in music, he writes and plays brilliant songs, and his banter during live performances is hilarious.

When he announced that he was writing a memoir about his life in 1967, it was a certainty that I would want to buy, read and review it.

What was less certain was whether I would like the memoir.

For an obsessive fan, I have to say that the book is at best middling, so I've rated it 3 1/2 stars, which I've rounded up to four stars.

My rating isn't so much a product of the book itself, more a product of my disappointed expectations.

A Year in the Life

I was really excited when I became aware that the book was constructed around songs that came out in 1967. I was even more excited when I started to encounter playlists of these songs on YouTube. Then I bought a copy of his album of covers called "1967: Vacations in the Past" (see the soundtrack below).

For some reason, I thought that the memoir was going to explain the influence these songs had had on Hitchcock's life and his music.

Instead, the songs act more like signposts on a year in his life at a private school called Winchester College, when he was 13 or 14 years old. They mark his journey through the year, rather than giving readers any special insight into the journey, let alone the songs themselves.

I had a similar experience when I first read David Mitchell's fourth novel, "Black Swan Green". Both books suffered from their adolescent immaturity, even if Hitchcock's memoir betrays a highly developed sense of humour.

Under the Floorboards

In the same way, the book doesn't live up to its subtitle: it doesn't really show us how Hitchcock got to 1967, nor does it spend much time elaborating on why he never left.

Hitchcock got to 1967 because he was born on March 3, 1953, and lived to experience 1967 while he was at school (i.e., he didn't live the year retrospectively). He listened to the music of 1967 on the radio and on gramophones that were at school and home at the time.

A five page epilogue comes closest to explaining why he never left 1967.

His passion for Bob Dylan never diminished, despite his disappointment with "John Wesley Harding" (Dylan's first album after "Highway 61 Revisited" and "Blonde on Blonde"):

"'JWH' didn't spend half the time on the record player that 'Highway 61' or 'Blonde on Blonde' did, and still do."

Likewise, I didn't buy an album after "BOB", until 1975, when Dylan released "Blood on the Tracks".


The front cover of "Blonde on Blonde"

Vacations in the Past

Although "JWH" was released in 1967, Hitchcock says it "signalled the Great Retreat:"

"The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, even acts such as the Doors jettisoned psychedelia and made their way back to rock 'n' roll..."

Hitchcock and his school mates had gazed into an alternative world of psychedelia and surrealism, they had liked what they had seen, they bonded over it, and they wanted to remain there, if not necessarily at Winchester College.

At the same time, they were "now part of a vast market that the record companies, the musicians, and the lifestyle sellers could exploit - and we loved it."

Paradoxically, Hitchcock doesn't overtly criticise the commercialism of post-1967 music, except to describe it as "increasingly mediocre music".

For him, more recent music just couldn't compete with the music of 1967:

"Music budded and came to fruition then in a way that - to my ears - has never been surpassed."

He wonders if later generations of fans "feel as intense about the music made now as we did about its hippie ancestors." I guess that's for you to say.

"[I] found my way upstairs and had a smoke
And somebody spoke and I went into a dream."
(The Beatles, 'A Day in the Life')

SOUNDTRACK:
(view spoiler)[
The Beatles - "A Day In The Life"



Robyn Hitchcock - “A Day In The Life�� (Beatles Cover)



Bob Dylan - "Visions Of Johanna" (Live 1966)



Robyn Hitchcock - "Visions of Johanna"



Robyn Hitchcock - "1967: Vacations in the Past"



This is Robyn's album of 1967 covers.

1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left



This is a playlist of some of Robyn's favourite songs from the year 1967.

Robyn Hitchcock Never Left 1967



Robyn Hitchcock On His Memoir, Brian Eno, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, & Why He Never Left 1967



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